And finally, half an hour later.
Lynn and the Silver-Haired Girl leaped high out of the enormous pit at the very center of Curse City and landed on the ground.
Black mist still churned thunderously above the ruins.
Lynn turned, the girl's forlorn expression reflected in his eyes. He gave her hand a squeeze and said:
"Let the past stay in the past. But if you ever get the chance, you can come back here whenever you like. Think of it as a kind of... remembrance."
Lynn knew.
What had happened here a thousand years ago had always been a shadow that haunted the girl's heart.
She had simply kept those nightmares hidden beneath her rational, composed expression, burying them in the deepest recesses of her heart where no one could see.
But at least...
"No."
The girl gazed silently at the pit for a long time before finally, slowly extending her slender hand.
"I will never come back to this place. If I could, I would even want everyone to forget it existed. Just as you said, the dead should never be disturbed again."
A blood-red glow radiated from her fingers.
Chains coiled around her like snakes.
And in the very next moment.
Rumble-
Under that tremendous force, earth and stone on either side thundered into the enormous pit, pouring inward and collapsing. The deafening roar sent her long hair streaming as she buried the underground hall once and for all.
At the moment of its collapse, a flicker of sorrow and grief visibly crossed her eyes, but she quickly concealed it. Like the temple where she had once been worshipped, she buried it all here.
Because no one remembered anymore.
She alone knew that countless lives had once been lost here for her sake.
And she no longer